College Football Nation: Tough way to win it all

Eric Avidon

Friday

Aug 31, 2007 at 12:01 AMAug 31, 2007 at 12:02 AM

If LSU is going to win the national championship, it's going to have to buck a trend. The Tigers expected to reach New Orleans and play in the BCS Championship. But LSU has a new starting quarterback in senior Matt Flynn, and it's rare for a team with a first-year starter to win the national championship, even when the talent around them is as good as it is at LSU.

If LSU is going to win the national championship, it's going to have to buck a trend.

The Tigers, who opened their season last night by winning at Mississippi State, are ranked No. 2 in both the preseason USA Today coaches poll and Associated Press media poll, meaning they're expected to reach New Orleans and play in the BCS Championship.

But LSU has a new starting quarterback in senior Matt Flynn, and it's rare for a team with a first-year starter to win the national championship, even when the talent around them is as good as it is at LSU.

Two other teams in the preseason top 10 of both national polls are also starting new quarterbacks - Wisconsin and Oklahoma - and face the same battle as LSU.

``The thing he needs to do is play very comfortably within the scheme, not try to make too many plays,'' LSU coach Les Miles said of Flynn early this week.

At the Southeastern Conference's Media Days, he elaborated a bit more.

``Any time you have a quarterback that starts in really his first season as a starter, there will be some period of adjustment. I think it will be minimal with Matt Flynn. Matt Flynn is a guy who is really deserving, really has competed for the opportunity to play against a quality quarterback in (last year's No. 1 NFL pick) JaMarcus Russell, and now it's his turn.

``Again, this is his first year,'' Miles continued. ``He may not play just perfect, but we'll like how he plays and see if ... he can't help engineer a tremendous season.''

Since the advent of the Bowl Coalition in 1992 - which morphed into the Bowl Alliance and now the Bowl Championship Series - there have been 16 national champions, including a split title in 1997, and only three had a first-year starter under center. In fact, of the 16, only three went up against teams with first-year starters under center in their bowl games.

That's a grand total of six out of 32.

The three who did win national championships are Jay Barker at Alabama in 1992, Tennessee's Tee Martin in 1998 and Craig Krenzel at Ohio State in 2002.

Two of the three had something in their favor that just jumps out, a reason you can point to that explains why a team with an inexperienced starter might survive a bad game by the quarterback and run the table.

Alabama had a special defense - not good, special. The Crimson Tide allowed a mere 9.1 points per game. Comparatively, last year's top scoring defense, Virginia Tech, gave up 11 points per game.

The Buckeyes, meanwhile, had an extremely favorable schedule. Before beating No. 1 Miami in the Fiesta Bowl, Ohio State played just four ranked teams all season - all at home, none ranked higher than No. 10.

LSU's defensive rankings last year were strong, and the Tigers bring eight starters back on that side of the ball. LSU was third in total defense (yards allowed) and fourth in scoring defense, giving up 12.62 points per game. But that's nothing like the 'Bama defense 15 years ago.

LSU's schedule, however, is slightly helpful. The Tigers play in the brutal SEC where they'll have to face the likes of Florida and Auburn. And one of their non-conference opponents is No. 9 Virginia Tech, but all the tough games are in Baton Rouge. Then a second potential matchup looms against Florida in the SEC Championship Game.

``We play a conference schedule as tough as any, and playing a championship game at the end of the season gives teams a pretty tough schedule,'' said Miles, adding, ``Virginia Tech is going to be a great challenge to us, but I haven't really given the schedule much thought beyond (last night's game).''

Last year, two teams were in a similar spot as LSU, near the top of the preseason polls, expected to contend for the national championship while starting new QBs. Texas, coming off a national title win in 2004, was ranked No. 2 in the preseason coaches poll and third in the AP poll, while USC, the team Texas beat in the Rose Bowl, was ranked third by the coaches and sixth by the media.

Neither ultimately factored in the national championship picture.

USC was in the mix until a bad loss to UCLA in its regular season finale. Not coincidentally, John David Booty had his lowest QB rating of the season that day. The Trojans wound up fourth in both polls after beating Michigan handily in the Rose Bowl.

Texas, meanwhile, wasn't even close to the top 10 after the last regular season game and was No. 13 in both polls after bowls. Colt McCoy put up gaudy numbers - 29 TDs and just 8 INTs - but in a loss to Ohio State his rating was a pedestrian 69.0, and when the Longhorns fell against rival Texas A&M he was picked off three times and his rating was a lousy 36.9.

Both Booty and McCoy had games where they were brilliant, but both had games where they looked every bit the first-year starter, and it cost their teams.

Like LSU, Wisconsin, which starts Tyler Donovan this season, has a strong defense (No. 2 in scoring) and a somewhat favorable schedule. The Badgers' highest-ranked opponent is Michigan, fifth in both polls, and the Wolverines travel to Camp Randall in November. Wisconsin also has a stud running back in sophomore P.J. Hill to lessen Donovan's load.

Oklahoma, however, doesn't boast a top-flight defense or a top-flight running game to take the pressure off redshirt freshman QB Sam Bradford. And the Sooners will be underdogs when they play Texas and now veteran QB Colt McCoy in the Cotton Bowl on Oct. 6.

``It gets down to executing, and he's done a good job with it (in practice),'' Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops said this week.

The absence of an experienced quarterback is a detriment to all three preseason contenders, but it doesn't automatically mean one can't win the national title. If any do play for the national championship, however, they'll be bucking history.

Game of the Week
There are no monster matchups in Week 1, no games like Virginia Tech at LSU, which highlights Week 2. The best of those is Tennessee at California. While that's a good inter-sectional game, it's not a great one.

There are a couple of games that stand out because of their implications on the conference race, and they're both in the ACC. Defending champion Wake Forest at Boston College is intriguing. It'll be interesting to see if Wake was a one-year wonder and what BC will look like with a new head coach - Jeff Jagodzinski - and new offensive coordinator in Steve Logan.

But even more intriguing is Florida State at Clemson at 8 p.m. on Labor Day. There's always the Bowden vs. Bowden plotline - papa Bobby at FSU and son Tommy at Clemson - but there's a lot more to this one than a family feud, Southern style.

Florida State had one of the greatest sustained runs of excellence in the history of college football, finishing in the top five every year from 1987 through 2000, winning national championships twice and playing for three others. But since then the Seminoles have been pedestrian, not once finishing in the top 10.

The dropoff coincides with the departure of former offensive coordinator Mark Richt, who left to become Georgia's head coach prior to the 2001 season. Jeff Bowden, another son of Bobby's, was hired as his replacement, and the offense slowed under his watch.

Jeff Bowden resigned, and former LSU offensive coordinator Jimbo Fisher, who helped the Tigers win the national championship in 2003 and groomed JaMarcus Russell, is his replacement.

``(The offense) will be similar, but I hope our results will be different,'' Bobby Bowden said. ``There's been so much publicity about the new offensive staff, but it's not likely you're going to go out there and run up and down the field. I expect to struggle, and I hope that they're struggling while we are, and then I hope we finally get something going and become an offense.''

He added, ``We'll have a good system, and our kids will have a pretty good grasp of it.''

It will be interesting to see how quickly Fisher can right the Seminole offense. The talent is largely the same as last year. Is a coaching change all that was needed to restore Florida State to the ranks of the elite?

Monday's trip to Death Valley will begin to show us.

But what makes this the game of the week isn't Florida State alone. Clemson looked like the class of the ACC two-thirds of the way through last season. The Tigers were killing teams. They were 7-1, the only loss coming in two overtimes at Boston College, and recent wins had come by scores of 52-7, 51-0, 63-9 and 31-7.

Then the Tigers fell apart, losing four of their last five, and after reaching No. 10 in the AP poll with that 7-1 record they ended the season unranked. Now there are questions about whether Tommy Bowden can ever take Clemson to the next level, whether he can ever get Clemson more than eight or nine wins in a given season.

``You know that (being on the hot seat) comes with the job description, so more so than others and this is one of those jobs,'' said Tommy Bowden. ``It desn't bother me that much because I can't name very many guys in this profession who haven't been on it, and you can start with Coach (Joe) Paterno and my father as two that have been. It's just part of the profession.''

If I had a ballot ...
Here's my national Top 10 poll right now:

1. USC: The talent is the best in the country, and the coaches are pretty good too.

2. LSU: Yes, the QB is inexperienced, but with all the tough opponents coming to Baton Rouge any loss would be an upset.

3. Texas: The schedule is just too favorable. The only game that should be close is Oklahoma at a neutral site, though a second meeting with Nebraska in the Big 12 title game won't be easy.

4. West Virginia: The Mountaineers play a Big East round-robin at the end of the year with Rutgers and Louisville, and this team is the best of that bunch.

5. Michigan: Like the Big East, the Big Ten has a late-season round robin, and the winner of the Wolverines' trip to Wisconsin on Nov. 10 could wind up undefeated.

6. Florida: Nine starters on defense is a lot to replace.

7. Wisconsin: The first test is at Penn State on Oct 13. If the Badgers survive that, they're in the hunt.

8. Oklahoma: That Texas game looms as the litmus test.

9. Louisville: A weak schedule hurts the ranking of a team that may finish with just one loss.

10. Virginia Tech: The best out of a conference full of mediocre teams.

(Eric Avidon is a Daily News staff writer. He can be reached at eavidon@cnc.com or 508-626-3809.)

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